Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-UD4H Motherboard Review :: BIOS and Overclocking

Gigabyte uses a modified version of the Award Flash BIOS for each of the Dual BIOSes on this motherboard. The main menu is split into the MB Intelligent Tweaker, Standard CMOS Features, Advanced BIOS Features, Integrated Peripherals, Power Management Setup, PnP/PCI Configurations, and PC Health Status.

Standard CMOS Features is where the HDDs are detected, the Date and Time are adjusted, total system memory and Floppy drives are detected. Advanced BIOS Features is where the Primary graphics are set, the various CPU functions are set, the HDD Boot Priority is set and the boot order is set. As this motherboard has integrated graphics you can set the Internal Graphics memory configuration, whether to use SidePort memory or not and what the primary graphics adapter is.

The Integrated Peripherals menu is where you set your SATA, your Onboard Audio, IEEE-1394, LAN, USB and Serial Port configuration. The Power Management Setup is where you set the Power functions including ACPI, Soft-Off by Power button, Power On functions. PC Health status is where your fans, temperatures and voltages are monitored. The MB Intelligent Tweaker is where all the overclocking is done on the motherboard.

The Gigabyte GA-MA790GP UD4H board was able to overclock successfully using EasyTune 6 to a frequency of 3.6GHz. This is pretty good on the default CPU cooler included with the retail packaging of AMD's Phenom II X4 940. With better cooling, I believe 4GHz is possible or even better on the 940. There are overclockers that have super coolant that have reached higher speeds, but that is not the purview of this review.

Here's a list of the settings and frequencies:	Setting Range
HT Link Frequency	Auto, 200MHz-1GHz
CPU Clock ratio	Dependent on CPU used
CPU North Bridge Frequency	Dependent on CPU used
CPU Host Clock Control	Auto, Manual
CPU Frequency (MHz)
PCIE Clock (MHz)	100-200MHz
VGA Core Clock control	Enabled, Disabled
VGA Core Clock (MHz)	200-2000MHz (700MHz default)
Set Memory Clock	Auto, Manual
Memory Clock	AM2 CPU: DDR2 400,533, 667,800. AM2+ X2.00, X2.66, X3.33, X4.00, X5.33
DCTs Mode	Ganged, Unganged
DDRII Timing Items	Auto, Manual
CAS latency	Auto, 3T-6T
RAS to CAS R/W Delay	Auto, 3T-6T
Row Precharge time	Auto, 3T-6T
Minimum RAS Active Time	Auto, 5T-18T
1T/2T Command Timing	Auto, 1T, 2T
TwTr Command Delay	Auto, 1T-3T
Trfc0 for DIMM1	Auto, 75ns, 105ns, 127.5ns,195ns, 327.5ns
Trfc0 for DIMM2	Auto, 75ns, 105ns, 127.5ns,195ns, 327.5ns
Trfc2 for DIMM2	Auto, 75ns, 105ns, 127.5ns,195ns, 327.5ns
Trfc1 for DIMM3	Auto, 75ns, 105ns, 127.5ns,195ns, 327.5ns
Trfc3 for DIMM4	Auto, 75ns, 105ns, 127.5ns,195ns, 327.5ns
Write Recovery Time	Auto, 3T-6T
Precharge Time	Auto, 2T, 3T
Row Cycle Time	Auto, 11T-26T
RAS to RAS Delay	Auto, 2T-5T
System Voltage Control	Auto, Manual
SB Volt Control	Normal, +0.1v-+0.3v
SidePort Mem Volt Control	Normal, +0.1v-+0.3v
NB Volt control	Normal, -0.200v-+0.300v
DDR2 Volt control	Normal +0.05v- +0.55v
CPU NB VID Control	Normal, dependant on CPU
CPU Voltage Control	Normal, dependent on CPU
Normal CPU Vcore	Normal voltage of CPU

BIOS Screenshots